The U.S. military plans to livestream the upcoming execution of Nidal Hasan, the former Army psychiatrist convicted of the 2009 mass shooting at Fort Hood, Texas. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that the December 3 execution by firing squad will be public, marking an unprecedented broadcast for a U.S. execution.
The Department of Defense plans to livestream the execution of Nidal Hasan, the former Army major sentenced to death for opening fire at a medical facility on the Texas base on November 5, 2009. The attack killed 13 people—including 12 soldiers—and injured roughly 30 others. The execution is scheduled for December 3 at the sprawling Fort Hood military installation.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth defended the decision to make the event viewable to the general public during an appearance on Real America’s Voice
, as reported by CBS News. Hegseth noted that setting the execution for a Thursday at 1 p.m. mirrored the approximate time, day of the week, and location of the original shooting, calling the operational choices a natural decision.
Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell shared on social media that the recommendation to use an Army firing squad came from Hegseth and received approval from President Donald Trump, according to reporting by CBS News. While civilian federal executions typically use lethal injection, the Justice Department indicated earlier this year that officials should evaluate alternative methods including firing squads and electrocution.
Legal Precedents and Historic Military Executions
If carried out, Hasan’s execution would be the first military execution in the United States since 1961, when a U.S. Army private was hanged after a court-martial conviction for raping an 11-year-old Austrian girl. The last military execution by firing squad occurred in January 1945 during the final months of World War II, when Private Eddie Slovik was shot for desertion.
Deborah Denno, a law professor at Fordham University who studies execution methods, noted that no livestreamed execution has ever taken place in the United States. A public broadcast would force an unprecedented level of transparency into capital punishment.
Eugene Fidell, a lawyer and military law expert who lectures at Yale Law School, told Al Arabiya that televising or livestreaming the event would be extremely, extremely strange
and legally uncharted territory. Fidell noted that the U.S. Supreme Court has never addressed whether a public broadcast of an execution is permissible under originalist constitutional interpretations.
Appeals History and the Fort Hood Court-Martial
Hasan’s path to the execution chamber followed a lengthy and contentious legal battle. During his 2013 court-martial, Hasan chose to represent himself and acknowledged that he carried out the shooting. He claimed at trial that he opened fire on fellow soldiers to protect Islamic insurgents from American military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Evidence presented at trial also revealed he communicated online with Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born radical cleric killed in a 2011 U.S. drone strike in Yemen.
Debate Over Transparency and Public Spectacle
Jonathan Lurie, an author and historian of military justice, questioned the practical justification for a public airing, asking what purpose it serves. Conversely, Denno suggested that exposing the reality of capital punishment could confront citizens with the state-sanctioned mechanics of the death penalty in a way that many people normally ignore.
